Schwöbel (Grotius Centre for International Legal Studies, Leiden U., the Netherlands) provides a critical examination of theories of global constitutionalism within the field of public international law. He argues that the contemporary visions of global constitutionalism are shaped by liberal democratic politics and the ideology of political liberalism, characterized by the two elements of formal autonomy and abstract equality. This liberal approach to global constitutionalism has significant limitations, such as the creation of an environment that favors hegemonic ambitions at the expense of diversity. In response to these limitations, he proposes "organic global constitutionalism," which is characterized by constitutionalism as flexible and adaptable process; constitutionalism as political and open to revision through discourse; the idea of constitutionalism as a "negative universal" with no positive content, instead being shaped in and through practices and institutions; and the idea of "constitutionalism to come" (analogous to Derrida's "democracy to come") for orienting change without fixing the precise course. Martinus Nijhoff is an imprint of Brill. Annotation ©2011 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)